November college basketball games all count when it’s time to fill a 68-team bracket, but they are mostly like baseball spring training games. No one will remember who won, and a team ranked high in November may be scuffling for a bid in March. But it’s a good first look at the teams considered national title contenders as well as local teams like UCLA and USC, who can dream about March Madness now without penalty.

Later in the week, ESPN has Texas-Arkansas Friday (4 p.m.), and the Pac-12 network has Long Beach State at UCLA (Friday, 8 p.m.) and USC-Vanderbilt (Sunday, 6 p.m.).

BEST OF THE REST

NFL, Nov. 5, 8, 11

Parity in the NFL may be subservient to the joy of watching great teams clash before the playoffs, but the upside is that every game has some potential to impact the masses fighting for wild card berths.

ESPN’s Monday nighter is Tennessee at the defending Super Bowl Champion Eagles, who are sitting on the fence this season (5:15 p.m.) like a feckless sparrow. The Thursday nighter will be Carolina-Pittsburgh (5:20 p.m., Fox and NFL Network), a better midweek game than usual.

The locals once again will be on TV head-to-head, with the Chargers at the woebegone Raiders and the Rams hosting former USC coach Pete Carroll and the Seahawks (4:25, CBS). If the Seahawks post an upset, expect USC fans to consider kidnapping Carroll and making him replace poor Clay Helton on the Trojan sidelines.

CBS has a 10 a.m. game, most likely Patriots-Titans, and NBC (5:20 p.m.) ends the night with another Eagle game, against Dallas. Watch closely, it could be Jason Garrett’s last game as the Cowboys coach.

COLLEGE FOOTBALL

Nov. 9-10

The fallout from the weekend has thinned the herd for the playoff field. The season and bids now will likely come down to Alabama-Georgia in the SEC title game, the Big 12 season-ender between Oklahoma and West Virginia, and Michigan-Ohio State in the Big Ten East.There are good games this week, however. Fresno State-Boise State (7:15 ;p.m., ESPN2) is a Friday night battle between two of the four WAC teams that are probably as good as any of the mid-tier Power 5 teams.

Diehard Pac-12 fans at least know every game is competitive these days, with lots of modest upsets, and where ten teams are .500 or better, the Bruins and Beavers the only laggards. West Coast patrons have UCLA-Arizona State (11 a.m., Pac-12), No. 8 Washington State at Colorado, a classic trap game (12:30 p.m., ESPN), Oregon-Utah (2:30 p.m., Pac-12), Oregon State-Stanford (6 p.m., Pac-12); and Cal-USC (7:30 p.m., ESPN).

Alas, UCLA and Oregon State do not meet this season. And as hard as this space has been on the Bruins, it needs to be mentioned that every Bruin opponent in 2018 is .500 or better (58-25 combined), including three 8-1 non-league games.

SOCCER

Nov. 6, 8, 10

The UEFA competition has reached mid-point in group play and a lot of contenders are on TNT this week. Tuesday, Belgrade meets Liverpool (10 a.m.) and Inter-Milan meets FC Barcelona (noon); Wednesday, its CSKA Moscow-AS Roma (10 a.m.) and Juventus-Manchester United (noon).

Thursday, the USWNT plays a friendly with Portugal (10 a.m., ESPN2) and the USL, the second-tier U.S. league, plays its title game between Phoenix and Louisville (5 p.m., ESPN).The MLS is in its semifinals Saturday, and ESPN has the New York Red Bulls-Columbia (noon) and Atlanta-N.Y. City (2:30 p.m.).

AUTO RACING

Nov. 9-10-11

NASCAR is down to the last four dates of the season. All three races from Phoenix this weekend are televised, the NASCAR Camper series (Friday, 5:30 p.m., FS1), the Xfinity series (Saturday, 12:30 p.m., NBC) and the Sprint series Can-Am (Sunday, 11:30 a.m., NBC).

Also Sunday, FS1 has the finals of the NHRA Drag Series from Pomona at 1 p.m.

GOLF

Nov. 8-9

The PGA Champions Tour, aka the old guys, has its season-ending event in Phoenix, a two-day, 36-hole adventure for the top 36 players of the season, with $2.5 million in prize money, which is a good reason for duffers who aren’t seniors yet to pick up their game and try and qualify for the tour.

The field includes Bernhard Langer, who has dominated the tour for years, Scott McCarron, David Toms, Vijay Singh, Long Beach/OC fav Paul Goydos, Tom Lehman, Duffy Waldorff and Brit legend Colin Montgomerie. The Golf Channel has play both days at 1 p.m.

UFC

Nov. 10

FS1 continues its UFC coverage with a day’s worth of prelims Saturday leading up to the featherweight title match (7 p.m.) between Yair Rodriguez and the Korean Zombie. FYI, that’s not Glenn from the Walking Dead series.